Process for renovating and refining butter.



PATENTED JUNE 11, 1907. G. G. MARTIN & W. D. JONES. I PROCESS FORRENOVATI'NG AND REFINING BUTTER.

' APPLICATION FILED AUG. 27, 1 906.

UNITED STATES PATENT oF r-on- CHARLES C. MARTIN AND WILLIAM D. JONES, OFDENVER, COLORADO; SAID JONES ASSIGN OR TO SAID MARTIN.

PROCESS FOR BENOVATING AND REFINING BUTTER.

To all whom it may concern."

Be it known that we, CHARLES 0. MAR-- TIN and VVILLIAM D. JoNEs,citizens of the United States of America, residing at the city andcounty of Denver and State of Colorado, have invented a new and usefulProcess for Renovating and Refining Butter, of which the following is aspecification.'

Our invention relates to improvements in processes for renovating andrefining butter, oils, lard, and fat, and the objects of our inventionare: First, to provide a rocess for butter and other naturally solidfatty products, but which is especially adapted for butter, and thatwill eliminate the curds, most of the moisture, impurities, fungus, and

other gerni life, and that will leave the butter practically dry, andrefined.

' for ercolating the has f) or other material thoroughly renovated,Second, to provide means for melting and separating the curds fromstale, rancid, and impure butter, and butter with foreign taste and oilof the butter after it een melted and the curds have been removed fromit, with hot air of a temperature of from aboutil 00 to about 200degrees Fahrenheit, to eliminate the greater ortion of the moisture, andto eliminate the orei'gn taste, and impurities contained therein, suchas fungus'and other germ life, and to reduce it to a dry and pure sweetbutter oil, and then to subject it to an emulsifying and to a congealingand to areworking treatment. Third, to provide a butter'purifying andrefining process, that will thoroughly purify, sweeten, and make abutter that ispure and that will be less susceptible to impurities orcontamination than commercial machinery-made creamery butter. Fourth, torovide 'a process by which creamery-made utter may be refined orurified, and by removing the fungus or ot er objectionable germ lifemake it more Wholesome and lasting in quality. Fifth, to provide aprocess in which the butter oil is aerated by thousands of needlelikejets of hot air, applied under pressure enough and in such a manner thatthe hot air percolates through the butter oil in small penetrating,independent hot air jets, that exert aseparating, and comminuting actionon 'the semi-liquid, and the albuminous, mucilaginous substances, andthat are given suflicient ressure to kee the butter oil in a state of eullition or vio ent boiling action.

7 Specification of Letters Patent.

Application filed August 27. 1906. Serial No. 332,263.

- Sixth, to

Patented June 1 1, 1967.

provide a process in which the butter oil after being aerated andpurified by the percolation through it of hot air under pressure enoughto keep it in a'state of ebultion or violent boiling condition, issubjected to a mechanical emulsifier treatment in which the buttercommingles with milk without the presence or introduction to the butterand'milk of either hot orx cold air. Seventh, to provide a new andimproved hot oxygen percolating and agitatlng process forrenovating,purifying, refining, and eliminating the molsture, fungus, growth, germlife, impurities of all kinds from melted butter oil.

Our process contemplates the use of any suitable ap aratus which may bepractically, economical and successfully operated, but during thedevelopment and ractical operation of our process We have esigned anapparatus which is new in its main features, and We preferablyillustrate this apparatus in the accompanying drawings.

In this apparatus: Figure matic view of the apparatus we employ in thepractical operation of our process. And Fig. 2, is a detail view partlyin sectionfof one of the air conveying coils located within the refiner.

While our process is adapted to the renovating and refining of oils,lard, and f.3t.,=jlt has been especially designed -for renovating andrefining butter, and we will describe it for renovating and refiningbutter only.

, Our process consists of a series of steps, which are as follows: Thebutter is first melted by applying heat to it, to a fluid state in anysuitable tank, receptacle, or vessel, and While inthis melted state thegrosser impurities, such as curds and any foreign matter of a heavierspecific gravity than'the butter oil will settle out of it to the bottomof the tank, receptacle, or Vessel, and the butter oil, free from theseelements, is drawn off and is ready for the next step in the process. Inpractice we preferably carry out this ste of our process in thefollowing manner: e melt the butter in a machine having a large butteroil holding capacity, and preferably use a tank holding preferably aboutthirty-six hundred pounds of butter oil, and we have especially inventeda machine 1, for this purpose, which we term the melter and curdseparator, and which consists of two 1, is a diagram-- of the tank 3, aheated platform 8, is placed,

4 trolled discharge pipe 15.

to a supply of steam. Below the heated tanks 2 and 3, onebeing placedwithin the 1 other. The outer tank 2, 1s rovided with a l body of hotwater, which is lrept heated by 1 any suitable means; preferably a steamboiler 4 is used, from which a pipe 5 extends to the tank, and isconnected to a coil of pipes 6, within the outer tank, and a returnpipe? extends from the coil to an exhaust receptacle 7A at the boiler.The tank 3, rests inside of the tank 2, and extends above it, and itslower portion is surrounded by. the water in the outer tank, and at therear end on which the butter in masses is placed, the practice being totake barrels,kegs, or boxes of butter, which are the ways it isgenerally shipped, and knock the barrels or kegs or boxes to pieces, andhoist the mass of butter on the platform, which is heated by anysuitable means. This platform however, preferably consists of coils ofpipe-9, connected platform, a trough 1O is placed, and the melted butterruns down the trough into a depending compartment 11., formed at one endof both tanks, which is lower than the body of the tanks, and the curdsin the butter oil settle into this depending ortion of the tank 8, inthe bottom of which a valve discharge pipe .12, is placed, and thebutter oil is thus separated from the curds and it flows throughapertures which are arranged in a vertical row, and are provided withremovable plugs 13, that are adapted to be removed and the aperturesopened and closed by an operator to suit the height of the melted butteroil in the curd settling',compartment, and in the body of the tank3another curd settling compartment 1.4 is formed, which is provided witha valve-con- This curd compartment is adapted to catch any curdsescaping with the butter oil into the body of the tank from thecompartment 11, and the two dischar e pipes 12 and 15 lead to a curdreceiving receptacle 15A. This melted butter oil is kept he ated by thehot water of the lower tank, in order to hold it in a fluid form at alltimes while there is butter oil in the tank. The butter oil is thenconveyed by a suitable pipe or conveyer 16, to a machine, comprising adouble receptacle,-tank, or vessel 17, which we term the pneu1matic,perl colator and refiner, which is made of such an I area that the butteroil will be confined in a body of shallow depth, and in this tank wesubject the butter oil for a periodof time of from about three to fivehours, to a continuous boiling action, which we impart to it bypercolating substantially evenly throughout its area thousands, ofneedle-like jets of hot air under sufficient pressure to have a liftingeffect on the butter oil, and of sutlicient pressure to exert aseparating, and comi'ninuting effect on some of the semisolid, mucilaginous, albuminous, sticky, and other natural or any foreign substancethat may be present in the butter that is under renovating and refiningtreatment. The amount of time required to treat a charge of butter oilin this pneumatic percolating refiner, depends on the qualityof thebutter being renovated and refined. This pneumatic percolating andrefining machine consists of two tanks 18 and 19, one within the other.The inner tank 19, may be of any desired capacity, but in practice wepreferably make it to hold charges of about twelve to fifteenhundredpounds of butter oil; consequently the contents of thebutter melting andcurd separating machine is emptied into it when a charge of this weighthas been melted in the melting and separating machine, and the innertank 19 is made of an area that will permit this charge of butter oil tostand in it at ashallow depth, preferably a de th of a few inches, thedepth depending on t e pressure of the hot air, but we have found inpractice that we obtain the best possible results with a pressure offrom about eight to sixteen ounces of hot air per square inch, and witha depth of about ten to twelve inches of butter oil, and we heat the airto a temperature of from about one hundred to two hundred degreesFahrenheit, and we dis- 9 charge preferably about ten hundred to twelvehundred cubic feet of hot air into this depth and volume of butteroil'per minute.

The inside tank 19, sits within the outside tank 18, and the outsidetank 18 is heated by any suitable means, preferably by being filled IOOwith water, which is heated by a steam pipe 20, extending from theboiler 4, to a steam pipe 21, located within the outer tank, from whichan exhaust pipe 22 extends. This hot water. is used to keep the butteroil at a proper melted liquid state, when for any reason the hot air hasbeen shut off. The inner tank is a closed tank, and is provided Withasuitable cover 23, which is preferably positioned at the ends of thetank. The percolating air jets are introduced into the tank through anair conveying pipe 25, which-extends into the tank and is arranged alongits bottom in the form of coils 26, which are arranged to practicallycover the bottom of the tank, and are provided with a verylarge numberof small apertures 27, .which' are placed close together along the pipeand are arranged in the pipes of the coils to discharge the air jets inall directions if desired, but preferably downwardly, so as to dischargeclose to or against the bottom of the tank, although if desired they canbe placed at any angle. In practice we use in the coils of a tankcapable of holding about twelve to fifteen hundred pounds of butter oil,three thousand of these air j etperforations, and arrange them and thecoils so that these jets of air are discharged close together into thebut- IOS ter oil, and substantially evenly throughout the tanks area.The air is supplied by any suitable air compressing machine, such as ablower 28, from which the pipe 25 extends to the tank 19. The. blowerdraws the air through an air filter 28A. Q

The hot air that forms the percolating jets may beheated before itenters the blower or after it leaves the blower, or it may be heated inthe course of its compression, to the desired degree, if an aircompressor is used, but

we preferably heat the air'by inserting within the pipe 25 that conveysthe air from the blower to the tank 19, a steam coil 29,'which isconnected to the steam boiler 4 by a pipe 30. An exhaust pipe 31, isalso extended from the cdil. The air then passes through thesteam-heated coil as it flows through the pipe, and is heated to thedesired degree of.

cat, which is regulated at the boiler. This hot air flowin into thissized charge of butter oil under this pressure and in such a greatvolume per minute, percolates through the butter oil with such aconstant steady force that it keeps the butter oil in an intenselyforcible bubbling action. 'The heat and force action of so manythousands of needle-like jets of air, force up through the butter oiland carry with them any deleterious, impure, and foreign elements andsubstancesthere may be in the butter oil, and they destroy, eradicate,eliminate, and drive out the germ and fungus matter, also the greaterportion of the moisture, and after from about a two to five hour hot airpercolating and aerating and refining treatment the butter oil isreduced to apractically pure dry butter oil. The hot air is thenshutoff, andthe butter oil is then removed from this hot air aeratingtreatment tank, and is conveyed to an emulsi ing treatment tank, whereit is mixed with properly pasteurized and prepared milk, or if desiredwith cream, or butter milk, or with sour milk, but preferably withpurefresh properly prepared milk, from which air or oxygen, either hot orcold or in vany form, is excluded, as its presence under pressure in thebutter oil and milk in a measure drives out from the milk and butter oilthe bouquet or sweet tasting flavor of the milk, which is the essentialelement we wish to impart to the butter oil by the emulsifyingtreatment. These innumerable hot jets of air flow with I sufficientpressure up through the butter 'oil to separate from it and carry upthrough it to ,its surface and into the space in the tank above it, anyimpure, foreign, and deleterious matter therein, and thisimpure,foreign, and deleterious matteris removed from the surface and fromabove the surface of the butter oil, and from the tank by a suction airblast that is strong enoug and has capacity to draw from the tank hedischarge of the thousand to twelve hundred feet of hot percolating airjets per minute, and carry all of this matter with it. This'suction airblast may be operatively connected to the charge of butter oil by any ofthe commonly used air suctiondevices, such as a suction blower or fan32, and suitable piping 32A, leading from above the surface of thebutter oil and connected to the receptacle tank or vessel in which it isconfined to the atmosphere. In the practical application and operationof this feature of our invention, however, we attach ..a large funnelshaped pipe 33, to the central portionof the top of the tank, whichextends'to the atmosphere. A drip trap 34, which is provided with aplugged discharge aperture, is formed in the pipe to catch the oilcarried into the lower end of the pipe by the suction air blast, and inthe pipe the suction fan32, is placed, which is operatively connected toan electric motor 35, or other source of power, which is of capacityenough to suck the volume of percolating air and the freed and separatedimpurities from the butter oil and tank.

The purified and refined butter oil, when it is run into a mixinemulsifier, is very thoroughlystirred,kneai ed,agitated,washe(il, andmixed with propcrlypasteurized or otherwise prepared milk, cream,buttermilk, or sour milk, until it is fully and thoroughly emulsified.This emulsifying step in our processmay be carried out in any positivelyacting, mechanical stirring emulsifying machine, but in the practicaloperation of our process we have found it necessary to provideamechanical and positively operating milk and butter-stirring, kneading,and mixing and emulsifying device 36, as we do not treat the refinedbutter oil to an air blast either hot or cold in the presence of milk orin. the presence of sour milk or in the presence of butter-milk, or inthe presence of cream, or in the presence of any other material, and wedo not use air either hot or cold in the form of percolating jets in theemulsifying treatment, but we confine this treating of the refinedbutter oil and milk-to a mechanical mixing of the butter oil andthemilkuntil the butter is properly emulsified by and with the milk. Thiseniulsifying device comprises a tank 37, having a. conical bottom, inwhich a valve discharge aperture and pipe 38, is placed, and which issurrounded by an outside tank 39, that forms a steam or water jacketedspace 40, around the tank, which is provided with valve water inlet pipe41; in the axial center of this tank we rotatably mount a vertical shaft42, that is provided at its upper end with; a driving pulley 43, that isadapted to be connected by a belt to a source of power, such as anelectric motor 44. On this shaftat the lower portion of this tank, vacsecure a screw-bladed propeller i5, and at a short distance above thepropeller and in t portion of the tank we form partit oi or diaphragm46, across the tank, in which a plurality of apertures 47 are formed,for the butter oil to flow through: around each of the apertures 47 onthe upper side of the floor we form an angular baffle plate 48, whichare all ada ted to deflect the jets of butter oil and mil from verticaland other channeling paths. The water or steam jacket space is connectedby a valve pipe 49, with the boiler4, and this space is filled withwater which is heated and kept hot by steam from the .boiler .4.The-renovated and refined butter oil is then run 'into the emulsifier,and a suitable supply ofproperly prepared milk is also run into theemulsifier from a suppliyxtank 50, until the emulsifier contains a edcharge, and We preferably make this emulsifying machine to receive thefull charge of the melter and curd separator, and

of the airpercolatin tank, which as above stated is about I twe ve tofifteen hundred pounds. After the emulsifier has been filled up, thescrewpropeller is rotated preferably at a speed of from about onehundred and fifty to two hundred revolutions per minute.

Our mechanical emulsifier treatment of butter oil differs from allothers, in the fact that we do not treat the butter oil to an air blastin the presence of milk, or to an innumerable number of divided andindependent air percolating needle-like jets, and in fact do not,in anymanner treat the butter oil with air in any form in the presence ofmilk, our treatment being purely a mechanical commingling and mixinprocess of the butter and the milk, which is effected by rapidlyrevolving the screw propeller, which forces the butter oil and milk upthrough the apertures in the floor across the tank, which jets areprojected in different directionsup through the mass of butter oil andmilk, while at the same time the butter oil and milk are steadilyflowing down to the bottom of the tank; consequently the butter oil andthe milk arekept in a constant and continuous endless movement throughthe central and other apertures'of the diaphragm across the tank untilit is thoroughly mixed to a butter-oil milk fluid, and with not too reatan agitation to prevent a thorough emuIsification of the butter oil andmilk, which mixing imparts to the butteroil a good pure butter taste.This butter oil mixing treatment is continued for a period of time offrom about 10 to 30 minutes, as the emulsification is very rapid. Assoon as this mechanicalmixing emulsifying treatment is complete, theemulsified butter oil is run into a cooling and congealing tank 51,which comprises a tank in which a body such as a' motor 53', where it isreworked to a commercially salable and consumable condition.

Our process is very simple. It is practically automatic and continuousin its opera-- tion, and it will renovate and refine old butter, andwill improve in purity new creamery butter, in a very much less time andwith very much less expense than the processes at present in use; andwhile we have described the preferred method of carrying our processinto operation, and the referred apparatus we employ in praotioa lyoperating our process, we do not wish to be limited to the exact methodof carrying out the several steps of our process, or to any particulartype or character of apparatus, as many changes mightbe made withoutdeparting from the spirit of our invention.

Having described our process, what we claim as new and desire to secureby Letters Patent, is:

A process for renovatin butter, which consists of first melting an searating the curds from the butter and of eeping said butter oil in amelted condition, thenconfining a shallow quantity of saidmelted butteroil in a shallow mass in a melted state, and free from contact with milkor any other.

emulsifying fluid, and from water, and treating said melted butter oilto innumerable jets of hot air under pressure enough'to keep saidquantity of melted butter oil in an agitated condition, and until theimpurities have been driven out of it, then removingsaid' impurities byair suction, then keeping said butter oil in a heated condition but freefromthe presence of air under pressure, and mixing it with properlyprepared milk or cream or butter-milk or sour milk until it has becomean emulsified butter oil, then cooling and co'ngealing said emulsifiedbutter oil, and then reworking said congealed, emulsified,

IlO

and purified butter oil to a perfected commercial and consumable state.

In testimony whereof we affix our signatures in presence of twowitnesses;

' CHARLES C. MARTIN. WILLIAM D. JONES. Witnesses: i G. SARGENT ELLIOTT,ADELLA M. FowLE'.

